1. Technical Field
The present invention enumerates to a technique of inhaling salt air (halotherapy) to a person""s lower respiratory tract to provide symptomatic treatment for major ailments to a person""s lungs such as bronchial and allergic asthma. More expressly, the present invention is designed to provide a method of exercising and strengthening the lungs of a person with major respiratory ailments.
2. Background Art
The usage of inhaling salt air (halotherapy) has been practiced for centuries in eastern Europe in such places as Wieliczka Kapahia, the oldest operating salt mine in Europe. The mine has been in operation for over 800 years and has more than 120 miles of passageways and chambers on nine levels to a depth of more than 1,000 feet. It is used as a sanatorium for people who have bronchial and allergic asthma. Patients live on the surface and are lowered into the mine each day for six hours where they breathe soothing salt air. Wieliczka is eight miles southeast of Krakow, Poland.
In recent times halotherapy has been noted as a powerful drug-free treatment for patients with chronic respiratory ailments. When a salt mine or cave is not available special rooms are created to simulate the atmosphere of the interior of the salt mines. Nevertheless, monetary restraints limit most patients from availing themselves of the healing salt air of the mines or created rooms. This creates a need for a portable apparatus that provides halotherapy treatment to respiratory patients wherever they might be.
It is the main objective of this present invention to supply a method of inhaling salt air for daily treatment and exercise of a patient""s lower respiratory tract from a portable inexpensive apparatus.
The present invention is an apparatus designed specifically to exercise and strengthen the lungs of people with respiratory ailments. It works simply by taking air from the room and allowing it to enter the present invention through two perforated cylinders, one inside the other, that are lined with paper filters. Common table salt is then fully packed the entire space between the two paper filters. The salt-filtered air then enters an inner chamber containing a central pipe with three inhalation holes that are bordered on both sides by two magnets, with like poles repelling each other, that are attached creating a negative magnetic field. After the salted-air passes through the inhalation holes air travels up the central pipe passing through a flotation ball (marble) which is a safeguard designed to prevent exhaling air back into the central pipe and inner chamber. Once the salted-air passes the flotation ball it continues traveling through flexible corrugated plastic tubing to a plastic breathing regulator. The regulator consists of two perfectly suitable plastic cylinders that are assembled at right angles with each other. Primarily it controls, regulates, the air intake of the user. More precisely the exhaled air of the user. This is accomplished by creating resistance in the upright cylinder. Screwing a center bolt in the upright cylinder creates the resistance. Turning one-way, or the other, the regulator creates more or less resistance. The exhaled air of the user is trapped in the regulator and released through the upright cylinder and back into the room where the present invention is placed. This ability to create resistance as the user is exercising and strengthening their lower respiratory tract (lungs) with beneficial salted-air provides a more potent means of halotherapy and as time progresses the user breathes more freely and with greater ease.